News In Brief

By Compiled from wire service reportsRobert Kilborn and Samar Farahr

March 6, 2001

Coca-Cola's president and chief operating officer, Jack Stahl, will resign immediately after only one year in the job, the giant soft-drink producer announced. The decision is pegged to a new management strategy intended to reorganize the company and boost its growth, which has hovered around 4 percent in recent years. The restructuring eliminates the need for the posts Stahl held, reports said. Coca-Cola plans to create four strategic units: the Americas; Asia; Europe/Africa; and New Business Ventures.

Long-term energy contracts may fall far short of resolving acute supply problems anticipated in California this summer, The Wall Street Journal reported in its online edition. Under the contracts made public so far, two vendors, Calpine Corp of San Jose, and Williams Cos. of Tulsa, Okla., are obligated to supply only 640 megawatts, or less than 2 percent of the state's anticipated peak needs this summer, the report said.

General Electric has been discussing a $4.5 billion to $5 billion sale of its Americom satellite business to Luxembourg-based Societe Europeenne des Satellites (SES), The Wall Street Journal reported. SES is a world leader in satellite communications, operating TV, radio, and broadband services under the Astra name and has made no secret of its interest in gaining a foothold in the US.